


Kamar-Taj Drabble Challenge: The Palmer-Strange Technique

by beetle



Category: Doctor Strange (2016), Marvel (Comics), Marvel 616, Marvel Cinematic Universe, Night Nurses
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Gender Changes, Angst and Feels, Christine Screams, Eventual Smut, F/F, Grief/Mourning, If Doctor Who can do it so can Doctor Strange, In Media Res, Marvel canon mixed with MCU canon, Night Nurses - Freeform, Past-Christine Palmer/Stephen Strange, Physical Symptoms, Post-Doctor Strange (2016), Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Pre-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Some Humor, Some Plot, Spiritual Illness, clinic, mystical illness, some smut
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-02
Updated: 2020-09-02
Packaged: 2021-03-07 00:13:09
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 1,800
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26257702
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beetle/pseuds/beetle
Summary: Dr. Christine Palmer seems destined to be tangled up with the Doctors Strange . . . even if the Multiverse has to import them from other dimensions.For the Kamar-Taj Drabble Challenge: Write one hundred new drabbles based offone hundred promptsfocusing on Doctor Strange and Marvel | MCU characters and ships.
Relationships: Christine Palmer/Alternate Universe Doctor Strange, Christine Palmer/Always Female!Doctor Strange, Christine Palmer/Original Female Character, Christine Palmer/Stephen Strange
Comments: 5
Kudos: 43
Collections: Kamar Taj Drabbles





	1. Hands - (100 words)

**Author's Note:**

> Set two days post 2016 film. Spoilers for MCU and Marvel canon, but also very much AU. The main-Stephen Strange is the **AU-Always-Female-Stephen Strange**. The prompts will be written as drabble, then droubble, then trabble, repeat ( or 100, then 200, then 300 word ficlets, then repeat), repeating until the ninety-ninth one, and then. . . .  
>   
> We'll see.  
>   
> Most prompt-fills will be rated M, but Explicit ones will be noted as such. See tags and chapter notes. See full challenge, including prompts, on [Tumblr](https://strordo.tumblr.com/post/627418931477528576/kamar-taj-drabbles-challenge).

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hands. One hundred words.

It’s been a long half-day, since Stephen Strange _magically_ reappeared in Christine Palmer’s life. Then disappeared, then _re-reappeared_ , with a soon-to-be-dead friend, who then died on the operating table.

_Stephen_ had then disappeared again, on _more_ magical business.

“Cult-life, yo. _It_ chose _me_ ,” she can almost hear him drawl. Her tired smile is wistful.

Normally, Christine takes the subway home. But as a taxi stops for her shot-up, wearily flopping hand, she admits _not_ getting subway-murdered takes focus she doesn’t have tonight. Her focus is primarily on her bed, for once. Rather than a lack of Stephen Strange in it.


	2. Lullaby (200 words)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lullaby. Two hundred words.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Jump scare for main character.

_Taxi-going-over-the-Manhattan Bridge_ is a lullaby with which Christine Palmer is long familiar and easily soothed.

Upon tipping the taciturn driver, she wastes no time getting to her door. Her key has been out and ready since before the Bridge and is in the lock before the driver’s pulled off into nonexistent, after-midnight traffic.

Once in the vestibule of her renovated building, she shuts the security door and listens for the _snick!_ of the lock engaging. Out of habit, she checks her mailbox, the third on the left. Even the harsh, stark fluorescent lighting doesn’t prevent her own name from blurring because of exhaustion.

With her handful of bills and flyers, she lets herself into the building, proper. Reaches beyond the doorframe to flick the light-switch more from habit than from hope. Renovation aside, the wiring’s a travesty. The light in the hall is _always_ shorting-out.

Her uncoordinated hand lands on the wall-plate then a hand suddenly lands on _hers_ : clammy, cool . . . _shaking_. She lets out a big squeak which might actually be a tiny scream.

She doesn’t hear the startled gasp it occasions.

“ _C-Christine_?” A low, disbelieving . . . familiar-drawling voice demands.

Before it’s lights out, _for-real_ , Christine thinks: _Not this again_ —


	3. City (300 words)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> City. Three hundred words.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hard R, borderline NSFW. Implied masturbation, exhibitionism and voyeurism.

The noises of New York City—always present, even throughout the night—prod Christine Palmer out of a semi-restful darkness.

Rather, the _absence_ of these is the prod.

“So _quiet_ ,” she mumbles, forcing achy-burning-tired eyes to open. They half-comply as she tries to sort dim light from shallow shadows.

She’s in her bed—still fully dressed—but fuzzy on how she got there.

“Whuhh?” She’s not expecting an answer, let alone her name. It’s sighed from deep shadows beyond the half-drawn drapes, yet as close and intimate as her skin. It’s an instant turn-on and she shifts languorously in her bed, feeling over to the left side— _Stephen’s_ side—for the long, rangy-strong body that her own _has_ missed.

Especially the _talented_ fingers and shameless _mouth_.

“Baby,” she sighs, as her right hand encounters cool, empty sheets. Her left hand encounters the zipper of her jeans, having made short work of the button. “Need your mouth on meeee. . . .”

“Fuck, _Christine_.”

“ _Noooow_.” She slides her fingers into her panties—into her body—smirking.

“ _Chrissy, I_ —” Stephen’s voice is haggard, whistling, husky . . . _hungry_. _Right_.

But.

Neither he nor anyone else has _ever_ called her _Chrissy_.

_Christine’s_ brain _boots_ , logging several other _glaring_ errors in reality:

The first error message: Stephen Strange (and his shameless, _talented_ mouth and fingers) hasn’t been in her bedroom in over two years.

The second error message: Stephen Strange is still probably off in magic-land, battling bad-cultists with crystals and mantras, and while wearing his weird, floating cape.

The third error message: Stephen Strange’s voice sounds further _up_ the tenor range than it should. Smoky, slightly raspy, going hoarse.

“Jesus- _fuck_ , I’ve _missed you, too_!”

Stephen’s voice, but too high. Too unhinged. Too. . . .

. . . _girlish_.

Christine whips her hand out of her panties—out of her body—and _screams_.


	4. Belong (100 words)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Belong. One hundred words . . . you're gettin' the picture, now :-D

Christine Palmer scrambles up the bed—then belatedly away from the left side and the window. The intruder steps out of the shadows and into the meager light of the streetlamp outside, where he . . . _she_ pauses deliberately, shaking hands held up in placation.

“I’m sorry, don’t—” she begins, then swears up a brief blue-streak, before sighing. “Ah, shit— _shitballs_. _Please_ , don’t be afraid of me, Chrissy. Not . . . not after everything. I don’t think I could take it.”

Christine stares hard into steady, tired, ice-and-flames eyes and, despite already knowing the _sane_ answer, she asks: “Oh, God . . . Stephen, is that . . . _you_?”


	5. Bookshop (200)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bookshop.

The intruder—who is _definitely not_ Stephen Strange, despite the eyes, the white streaks at both temples, and that _mouth_ —swallows, looking woebegone.

“Um. It’s _Stephenie_ , actually,” the intruder corrects in Stephen’s low-warm tone, but more alto than tenor: _STEEE-vuh-nee_. “Stephenie Strange. Everyone calls me, ah, _Steve_. Or Strange. Or Strange Steve—though, not to my face.”

Her manner is jaunty and shaky, unshielded and _intense_.

_Her manner_ is _Stephen’s_ —the way he’d been both times Christine Palmer had seen him lately, minus some steady-stoic self-effacement. Which Christine had found jarring when contrasted with the prior fifteen years of knowing him.

And where Stephen’s intensity hints at new growth, empathy, and maturity, _the intruder’s_ intensity hints at other things Christine can’t put a name to, other than quintessential Strange- _determination_.

She and the intruder make and maintain eerie, honest, _intent_ eye-contact. Like Stephen’s gaze often is, the intruder’s gaze is _piercing_. Pale-lightning set amidst a landscape of brass-glow skin and striking-strong bone structure.

But then she half-smiles and . . . it’s the _same_ half-smile Stephen had given her in the campus bookstore the day they’d met: sweet and sad, charming and bemused. Pained. Familiar . . . and _impossible_ to fear or doubt or distrust.


	6. Friendship (300)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Friendship.

Impossible . . . until it clicks for Christine Palmer:

This _has to be_ one of Stephen’s magical cultist-friends either playing a trick on her—and if so . . . she’s about to get pulled into something extremely _weird_ —or. . . .

Or it’s one of the _bad_ magical-cultists who killed Stephen’s friend and tried to kill Stephen, too. One who’s magically made herself look like someone Christine _still_ trusts over almost everyone.

More, _now_ , than _ever_ , despite all the weird _woo-woo_.

Stephen could very well be hurt, or . . . worse. This intruder, this _Stephenie Strange_ , could be a magic _monster_ , wearing his face like the worst kind of _Silence of the Lambs_ sequel.

Her eyes as wide as manhole covers, Christine winds up for another scream. The intruder’s eyes widen, too, and she flails her tremoring hands a bit.

Like _magic!_ . . . or maybe just _jazzhands!_

“Okay—please, don’t start screaming, again, Chri—ahhh, Nurse Palmer? You’re an ARR-ENN in this dimension, too, right?” The intruder looks both scattered and disheartened. Her slept-in-looking clothing of blue jeans, red and white checkered shirt that’s half-buttoned wrong and worn over a tan Henley, and a rumpled blue raincoat, adds to the look of extreme fluster with a dash of downtrodden. “Look, I’m not a murderer or a cannibal or a rapist, or anything, just— _please_ , don’t scream!”

Christine’s blinks, then huffs. “Well, I didn’t think you were any of those until you brought it up!” Which is only half-lie. Now . . . no-lie.

Murder-cannibal rapists are probably more composed and cleverer than _this_.

But . . . ‘accidentally manslaughtered by an inept robber’ is still _dead_. Christine means to take no chances.

“Who are you?” she swings her legs over the right side of the bed and jumps up. _Stephenie Strange_ watches her with Stephen’s pretty-sad, laser beam-eyes. “Are you one of Stephen’s . . . _woo-woo_ friends?”


	7. Scars

“’Woo-woo’ friends?” _Stephenie Strange’s_ wary face is, in so many intangible ways, _Stephen’s_ face. And in many tangible ways . . . not.

Dark, indifferently grown-out curls surround a hawkish, faintly _scarred_ face saved from _intimidating_ severity by waggly-messy eyebrows and a plush mouth that resembles Stephen’s more in curve of smile than in shape of lips.

But it’s a mouth _made_ for grins and smirks and. . . .

Those inescapable _eyes_ —not a _Strange_ trait, like Stephen’s height, but a _Haskell_ one—are increasingly confused.

“Ahhh. . . .” Her dark brows furrow. _Stephenie_ looks confused and a little goofy. “Are yoooou . . . asking if I’m a ghost?”


	8. Guilt

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Guilt.

“ _What_?” Nothing tiny about _this_ scream.

Well. _Screech_. Christine is quite suddenly beyond screaming—she’s not afraid anymore, fortunately or not—and well-down the four lane superhighway to Screechville, as Stephen had once accused, but _only_ once.

_Stephenie Strange’s_ half-smile makes a comeback and quickly widens. It’s as dashing-dorky as one of Stephen’s, and that’s . . . eerie. And comforting.

And _eerie_.

“Because if you already know about _ghosts_ that’s gonna make explanations about who _I_ am a _fuck of a lot_ easier for us both.” She grins, bright and cavalier and _guilty_ in all the ways Christine’s never had defenses against. But she can still fake it well, judging by the way Stephenie quails just a bit and clears her throat. “But, ahhh, no. I’m not. _Dead_ , I mean. Well, I _have been dead_ , more than I’d like, but I’m _currently_ alive. At least on the outside.”

When Christine’s only response is another, _glarier_ glare, Stephenie clears her throat again. “Okay, sorry, not the moment for humor. It’s my best defense mechanism, so, screw me.”

“You mean _sue me_ ,” Christine corrects.

Stephenie’s eyebrows waggle twice, while her mouth twitches.

“ _Ugh_.” Christine shakes her head but loses the fight to not laugh.


	9. Loss

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Loss.

Christine tries to quell her laugh and loses the battle the moment that cavalier ‘ _tude_ drains out of Stephenie’s smile and manner. Leaving behind unadulterated joy and the most desperate yearning. Intensified by that Haskell-blue gaze.

_Another_ look, one which Christine has only lately had a defense against. And that defense and kissing Stephen Strange goodbye had almost killed her not one day ago.

“It’s amazing, y’know?” Stephenie says, moving two steps closer, then stopping herself as if she’s hit a force-field. She shakes her head ruefully. Out of the direct glare of the streetlamp, her brass-glow skin is a lambent, but ashen _bronze_ : naturally rich, but pallid underneath, like she’s been unwell for a long time. “They say how, when you grieve for long enough, you idealize the one you lost. Forget all the flaws and imperfections . . . all the little ways they used to drive you batshit. How they could push _every one_ of your buttons—work your last sane nerve with just a _glance_. That they had this effortless, but _tremendous_ power . . . but only used it to nag about groceries or laundry . . . or about wearing a damn _coat_ when the weather finally turned, so you wouldn’t catch sick.

“All those _irritating_ imperfections. Huh. As if those _imperfections_ weren’t the _best_ things of all.”

She chuckles, brief and tired. But her eyes are still glowing, even without the borrowed phosphorescence of a streetlamp. “Ten years, and I haven’t forgotten a _damned_ thing, Chrissy. Not a-one. Eidetic memory, for the win. I . . . I remember it _all_. How could I _ever_ forget anything about _you_? Every bit of you is beautiful and _right_ and perfect, and I could _never_ forget. I’ll _never_ not want _every bit of you_ with every bit of _me—_ I’ll never stop _fighting to bring you back_.”

**Author's Note:**

>  **[PROMPT] :**  
>   
> [Exactly what it says on the tin — write one hundred drabbles based off the prompts below focusing on Doctor Strange characters and ships. While a drabble is a one-hundred word short story, you can go up to 300 words but no more. You can switch it up however you like, only that they be about characters in the Doctor Strange universe, from the comics (Hello, Victor :D) or the MCU. By the end of the challenge, you’d have written a maximum of 30,000 words of Doctor Strange content. This is a casual, ongoing challenge so there’s no deadline per se.](https://strordo.tumblr.com/post/627418931477528576/kamar-taj-drabbles-challenge)  
>   
>   
>   
>  **Thanks :**  
>   
> To anyone giving this a read (and hopefully a comment and/or kudo :-).  
>   
>   
>   
>  **Resources & References for this fic:**  
>   
> Google  
> IMDB  
> Marvel.fandom.com  
> Marvelcinematicuniverse.fandom.com  
> Wikipedia  
>   
>   
>   
>   
> [TUMBLES with the bug](http://beetle-ships-it-all.tumblr.com)! And [PILLOWFORTS with the bug, too](https://www.pillowfort.io/beetle-comma-the)!


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